As best placed Audi driver, Kristensen will start the first of the two 30-minute races from third position on the grid. Martin Tomczyk will be on the same row with another Audi A4 DTM from Audi Sport Team Abt Sportsline. Emanuele Pirro gave Audi Sport Infineon Team Joest its best DTM qualifying result so far. Rinaldo Capello impressed in his first race with the Audi A4 DTM: At his DTM debut, the Italian qualified immediately for the top ten.

The first of the two 30-minute races will start on Sunday at 1:10 p.m. local time. Chinese stations Shanghai TV und CCTV 5 will cover the DTM guest event live.

Quotes after the qualifying:

Rinaldo Capello (Audi Sport Infineon Team Joest / Audi A4 DTM #22)
8th place “Super Pole“, 1m 15.655s
“I am glad because obviously it does not happen so often that rookie qualifies for the Top Ten in the DTM. In the ‘Super Pole’ qualifying, however, I realised that I lack of experience, particularly with the tyres.“

Tom Kristensen (Audi Sport Team Abt Sportsline / Audi A4 DTM #12)
3rd place, “Super Pole“, 1m 14.557s
“My A4 has worked perfectly here right from the beginning. We have not changed anything except tyres. I like the car, I like the track. Being fastest in the two free practice session I was hoping for pole. We tried used tyres in the ‘Super Pole’ which I believe was the right decision. But I missed pole narrowly.”

Emanuele Pirro (Audi Sport Infineon Team Joest / Audi A4 DTM #44)
5th place “Super Pole“, 1m 14.775s
“I am really happy for the team because our beginning of the season was difficult. After the Adria test we worked well on the car and I feel really good on this race track. It was good to be in the Top Ten in qualifying and it is even better to be fifth. That’s a good start for tomorrow which will be a survival race.“

Frank Biela (Audi Sport Infineon Team Joest / Audi A4 DTM #45)
14th place, 1m 15.879s
“Of course I am not happy with this qualifying result. I should have been faster. Obviously I’m entering the corners a bit to quickly. I have to look at the data of my team-mates and try to learn from that.”

Ralf Jüttner (Technical Director Audi Sport Infineon Team Joest): “We managed to get two cars into the top ten and Emanuele in fifth place – that’s a good position to start the race. I am proud of our team. It has done a great job under this especially tough conditions we are facing here.”

Dr Wolfgang Ullrich (Head of Audi Motorsport): “We’ve seen a good team effort. Unfortunately, it just was not enough for the front row. It is very tight at the front of the grid. It’s difficult to predict what this will mean for the race. Various Audi drivers have the possibility to race at the front. We’ll try to make the best out of it.”